That smile plastered on my face??

On my usual early morning walk, my mind is trashing ALL the beauty around me - with worry. About Everything. STOP!

STOP halts uninvited texts, but doesn’t seem to work so well with uninvited thoughts. Damn.

A monkey mind and a fast-beating heart. Suddenly, an “Aha!” springs out of nowhere and I begin breathing more deeply. What a relief.

Springs out of nowhere? Not really. I smiled. Yep, that’s it - I smiled. Cheap therapy. It really is cheap therapy - not kidding. In a nutshell, “Smiling can trick your brain into believing you’re happy which can then spur actual feelings of happiness.”

Well, hot damn; I like it.

OK, yeah, I’d read this somewhere and it became the seed which germinated as my “Aha.” Up came the edges of my mouth, a little further up, and suddenly I had a full-blown smile.

Now, here’s the really odd part. I’m patting myself on the back for remembering about the impact of smiling and my outlook is feeling a bit more bright. Well, OK, then, I can probably quit smiling now. NOT. I couldn’t. I’m not kidding you. My lips did not want to come back down – no, they didn’t. So, here I am, walking along with a smile literally plastered on my face. The smile took on a life of its own. Jan no longer seemed to be in charge…

So I went with it. I mean, who wants to fight with herself over a smile? Not me. I can be flexible (on occasion.) And so I was.

Eventually my smile subsided on it’s own. I don’t think I noticed though because I was really enjoying my walk at that point…

Please feel free to share how you bring light into your life when you seem headed for the ditch!